The Illinois State Treasurer's Office hopes to reunite 11 Purple Heart medals with their recipients or their families.
It's called Operation Purple Heart, and State Treasurer Michael Freirichs thinks the upcoming observances of Veterans Day may prompt someone to search their memories and step forward.
Freirichs on Friday said it can be difficult to return military medals.
"We take this responsibility seriously. We know military medals are among the most difficult items to return because a name in which the honor was submitted as unclaimed property might not correspond to the name of the honoree," Freirichs said.
He offered one example.
"We had to track down one man. He had given his Purple Heart to his mother. It was in her safe deposit box when we found it," Freirichs said.
He added that the federal government does not have a database of military medal recipients.
He said the medals were discovered in bank safe deposit boxes in Channahon, Chicago, Darien, Decatur, Homewood, Oak Park, O'Fallon, Peoria, Round Lake, and Portland, Oregon.
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